Tales of the HalfBlood Prince
by Lady Devonna
Summary: Obviously, something of a spoiler for HP6. The life of the young prince, as envisioned by me. Starting with year 5.
1. Chapter 1

Eighteen sickles and forty-two knuts. That was… He wished desperately his calculator would work at Hogwarts. Despite one of the three highest tested IQs in England, magical or not, he wasn't very quick to math in his head. Whatever the answer, it was a lot of metal for poor Mjollnir to carry four hundred miles, and not nearly enough to help cover the rent. He considered getting someone to change it, but cutting his owl's load wasn't worth sending home two or three coins instead of the pile in front of him. Pride was as nonsensical as meaningless, but he still had quite a bit of it.

Mildly disgusted with himself, he bundled the coins into a sock and shoved it into an envelope with a short, evasive note. Pride had overstayed its welcome.

"Here, Molly." He tied the package to the elderly bird's leg, giving her beak an apologetic stroke. "Stay home for a week and rest once you get this there, but you better hurry. Mum'll probably fall short again." Not that a handful of pocket change would change that.

Mjollnir hooted her understanding. He watched her disappear into the night with glum detachment. Some deeply buried sense of fairness told him that an exceptionally brilliant fifteen year old shouldn't be making ends meet between homework and detention, ideals were too abstract for his taste.

For a few minutes, he slumped onto the table in front of him, heavy locks of black hair falling in his eyes. He couldn't find a comfortable way to slump in defeated dejection, however, and sat up again. Yes, life was lousy, but there wasn't much to be done about it.

"Hey, that paper done?"

"Has been for an hour." He passed three rolls of parchment to his customer. "No worries, it's all there. Give Nott his, too."

Ignoring the answer, if there was one, he rose and slipped out of the common room. Though he was allowed to roam the school as he desired for another half-hour, the residual guilt from his unsavory source of income made him jumpy.

He didn't have much of a sense of honor, but doing people's homework for them, whatever the cause, violated what conscience he had. It satisfied his vindictive streak to know the lazy bastards would all fail their exams, but he still didn't like it. And now that it wouldn't even cover the holes in the family finances, he was pleased to abandon the venture.

He'd been periodically petitioning Dumbledore for permission to get an afternoon and weekends job in Hogsmead for the last three years. He couldn't bring himself to admit the reason, though, and the headmaster had always refused him. Were he to divulge the disgraceful truth, there might be a chance. Or, about as likely, Dumbledore might be so tired of the constant interruptions that the long-sought acquiescence might be procured.

"Licorice wand," he said dully, eyes languidly following the gargoyle as it leapt aside. He couldn't even remember where he'd learned the password.

He paused outside the office itself, hearing several voices. He didn't want to interrupt Dumbledore. Squinting, he saw only the headmaster's thin silhouette through the frosted glass, and a fire devoid of floo powder. Suddenly timid, he waited a long moment before he rapped the door.

"Come in," said Dumbledore's pleasant voice, the others going silent.

Forcing himself not to hesitate, he pushed the door open and stepped inside. "Severus, to what do I owe the particularly late pleasure?"

He glanced down at his watch, only to find it had stopped working again. Still, he was fairly sure of the time. "It's only—"

"A mere jest." Dumbledore made a slight adjustment to one of his dozens of little silver things, very few of which seemed to have much of a purpose. Looking satisfied, he waved it away, and the contraption skittered away on its seven brittle legs. "Now, as to my question…?"

Still somewhat disconcerted by the polite patience he'd encountered in the headmaster for five years now, Severus took the longest moment he dared to compose his thoughts. Staring pointedly at the tips of his shoes (and noticing a growing hole in the left one that would need a _lot_ of spellotape), he poured out his request too fast for even himself to understand. "Dad's still out of work and Mum's job doesn't pay enough. May I please have permission to find work in town after lessons?"

Dumbledore waited a moment, presumably to pluck the individual words out of Severus' rapid tirade. "…Is this why you've been asking me this all along?"

Eyes still riveted on the hole in his shoe, he nodded.

"Why didn't you tell me?" Dumbledore's gaze finally drew Severus', and the soft understanding he read there loosened his tongue.

"Usually it's not such a big deal, but I couldn't get my usual job this summer, and the vault's empty. Even with me and Hector sharing books…" He shook his head, pulling himself out of the tangent. "Would _you_ want people to know _your_ Dad can't support his family?"

"No, I certainly didn't, and I was twice your age before I found the courage to confess." Severus inhaled sharply, not knowing what reply he could possibly make. "Speaking of Hector, where does he stand in this matter?"

"I don't think he knows. I mean… I never…" He trailed off. Though Hector was his younger brother by the slightest technicality (Severus had been born two minutes before midnight, his twin three after), he had always felt a protectiveness that suggested years of difference. And Hector earned it—he took naïveté to an extreme few humans had ever dared tread and, though of normal intelligence in most respects, was dumb as toast next to his brilliant brother.

"I see," said Dumbledore softly. "Well, Severus, I'm afraid I can't allow you to interrupt your studies to that extent two weeks from exams."

Incensed that his wrenching confession had been for nothing, Severus snapped up his head, about to give his venomous temper free reign.

"However, I believe I could convince one of the teachers to accept you as an aide. I few afternoons a week grading and organizing is the extent of the job, but I believe the proceeds should be of sufficient assistance to your mother. Over summer, I will appeal to the Ministry. School policy forbids underage students to work outside. But exceptions have been made in the past. Furthermore, I can put both you and your brother on student aid."

Ashamed of the outburst he'd barely bitten back, Severus nodded, hoping he looked grateful. Student aid hurt the pride he'd almost convinced himself he'd shed, but it would help, and Dumbledore had effectively solved the worst of his problems. "Thank you, sir."

"You're entirely welcome, Severus. Now, you'd best hurry back to your common room before Mr. Filch decides he needs someone to mop out Myrtle's bathroom. Discretion is the better part of valor."

Severus nodded and hurried from the office. Downstairs, however, he had no intention of returning to his common room. Listening carefully, he determined no one was nearby and skulked out onto the grounds, around to the large oak on the shore of the lake.

In the very last glimmers of the late sunset, he could make out three dark figures sprawled variously around the base of the tree. "What took so long?" asked the nearest one, the voice identifying Frank Longbottom.

"Nothing. _Lumos_." Severus had walked into the lake more than once without this precaution. His night vision was abysmal. Actually, all his vision was abysmal, but glasses weren't in the family budget. He made Hector read the blackboard to him and pretended to be lost in thought when he walked into things.

"That was really long nothing."

"And today's not very original comment prize goes, yet again, to my little brother." Severus' good moods were not readily apparent to bystanders. The only people who could generally recognize the difference between angry and ordinarily surly were the three right here. And one of them technically wasn't a person at the moment.

Severus leaned against a tree and let his knees drop out from under him. Even though he'd finally won the losing battle and secured the family home for a while longer, he was so exhausted he couldn't feel anything but fatigue. He had long ago trained himself to stave off tiredness, but that made it all the worse when he _did_ allow himself rest.

He was so tired it took him a moment to notice the cold nose nudging his shoulder. He bit back a squawk. Gingerly, he reached out to scratch the nose of the enormous black coyote that had grabbed his worn sleeve in its razor-sharp teeth and growled playfully. The coyote growled again, released his sleeve, and turned into a tiny, pretty girl.

"Hi, Sparrowhawk." He carefully watched the squid drifting across the lake, knowing how disheveled Phoebe could be after transforming and _really_ wanting to look.

"Dude, don't get all mushy about it. I was only gone a couple of days." She punched him in the back in what she seemed to feel was a companionable way. Though he could have dispelled the bruise with a flick of his wand, but, pathetic as it was, he liked physical proof that she'd actually touched him. Realizing that, all his cheer vanished and he thoroughly despised himself again.

Hector, lacking all of Severus' scruples and free of his cowardice, slung his arm over her shoulder in a carefully casual fashion. "Yeah, Phoebe, where _were_ you for three days?"

Playfully, Phoebe flung him head over heels into the lake. "You're a jerk, Hecky. Me? I was kinda… locked in the old potions classroom. No one could hear me, and it was really kind of fun in there, so I didn't really make too much effort."

"Only you, Phebes," Frank said dully. "You realize the whole school was in an uproar because you went poking into an old closet of ingredients behind a sealed door?"

"Well, I didn't know it was sealed! It let me _in_!" Phoebe pulled off her black combat boots, hiked up her robes, and waded into the lake. "Here, squiddy squiddy!"

Despite himself, Sev felt his eyes follow her progress into the still water, as she played a mildly deadly game of tag with the squid's tentacles. The one and only girl of all his dreams— No, just a very good friend, one of very few he'd probably ever have. Most likely destined to eventually go out with his brother, which had been pretty inevitable since they'd first laid eyes on each other after the sorting. Yes, he was over that. Completely.

What was bothering him was clearly that Phoebe had been missing (and completely happy) for three days without his knowing. He was definitely working too hard if he didn't have attention to spare for a _friend_.

"Come here, squiddy! Sev, get up and help me catch the squid!" Phoebe ran out of his field of vision, forcing him to actually turn his head to follow her. "I want to hug it!"

"And she's smarter than Dumbledore?" Frank snorted. "IQ tests are weird."

"Just because she's loony doesn't mean she's not a genius." Sev was resting his chin on his hands to disguise the fact the he was forcibly holding his head in place, so as not to watch Phoebe frolic around with a giant sea monster. He listened in total composure as he heard Hector get up and join her.

"Are you Sev? No! Go away. And tell your brother to get his skinny ass over here." There was a thud and a series of splashes as Phoebe pushed Hector's head underwater.

"Notice she shows her affection with violence?" Hector asked cheerfully, settling into the grass on Frank's other side. He pulled a half empty pack of cigarettes from his pocket and scowled. "Soaked. Sev, be cool for once and—" Severus boredly sent a blast of hot air at the sodden package. "Yeah. Though, you know, she's much nicer when she's a dog."

"Coyote," Severus corrected dully.

"Whatever, it's a weird looking dog. Though she does bite sometimes. Want one?" He offered his cigarettes pleasantly to all assembled, met Severus' scowl and Frank's disinterest with a grin, and went to follow Phoebe around some more.

"Affection, that reminds me." Frank shifted uncomfortably. "I'm supposed to tell you. You have a secret admirer."

Severus started up from a slouch so quickly he hit his head on the tree. "Who?"

"Um, secret. But given the circumstances, I'd bet a dozen galleons on Lily Evans. Don't know when she sustained the brain damage."

Since Severus had been about to make roughly the same comment himself, he didn't take offense. "Are you insane?"

"No, though I think she is." Frank shrugged. "No idea, mate. Must be that reclusive, artistic thing. You're a musician, you're barely aware she exists. It'd be just like a girl."

"That kind of girl, I guess." He felt himself going pale. As a matter of fact, Severus was well aware of Lily's existence, as whenever he got anywhere near her Potter felt obligated to curse the snot out of him. He'd assumed this was just a sort of personal challenge. Curse-Snivellus-whenever-Evans-is-around sounded like a "Marauders" kind of game. But now the full sinister implications hit him.

"What's wrong with_ you_?" Frank raised an incredulous eyebrow. "She's smart, she's good looking—_very_ good looking—and she's almost as good at potions as you. Obviously, she's crazier than Phoebe, but, you know, there are worse things. You'll have someone to force those Beatles records on and sit around the Slug Club with."

"_Potter_ would kill me! You _know_ he likes her! I get attacked three times a week as it is, damn it!" He shuddered. "I'd vanish under mysterious circumstances!"

"Why do you put up with them? Damn, Sev, you're the best duelist in the year, probably the school."

"Four against one, that's why."

"There're four of us," said Frank wisely. "Okay, so Hector doesn't know which end of the wand to hold, but we can set him against Pettigrew. And Phoebe's even a prefect, so she could cancel out Lupin the detention dispenser."

"Yeah, well, tell my secret admirer I'm… dead. Yeah. I'm going to bed."

"Like fun you are!" Hector put him in a very wet headlock. "We can't get back in without that charm!"

"Sparrowhawk knows it." Pulling his cloak more tightly against an imagined chill, he hyper-disillusioned himself and skulked back to his dormitory.


	2. Chapter 2

There were, he had to admit, a few bright spots in a world of darkness. Most of them were kippers. What could ever be better than salty, smelly little fishy things that glared at you while you ate them, with a tendency to crunch unexpectedly? Severus would never understand what was so unnerving about biting their heads off.

"Mr. Snape, I've been calling you for five minutes." He looked around with a start, finding professor McGonagall staring down her nose at him, mildly miffed. "I would be happy to convey your compliments to the chefs, but there is a limit understood."

As he'd actually heard her and assumed she wanted Hector, Severus decided not to argue. "What?"

"The headmaster has informed me that he's awarded you a position as a teacher's aide." She didn't seem to approve. Quite honestly, Severus didn't mind working for McGonagall, but an irritated McGonagall promised an inevitable fiasco. "Professor Slughorn would like to see you in the potions classroom."

He winced. She smiled slightly. "You've brought it on yourself, you know." Severus decided not to correct her and sped to the dungeons. Even if that unctuous heap of steaming fewmets did teach down there, it was his favorite part of the school. He fit.

The door was closed. With a brief glance upward, though whether he sought strength from some higher power or the ceiling he didn't know. Now, to step into the power of the Slug. He knocked. "Professor? It's me."

"Ah, Sevvy, my boy, enter!" boomed the phenomenally annoying voice from within. He might have known this would happen. Keeping his expression neutral, he slid into the classroom. A pile of very decidedly dead lizards was stacked in a cauldron, horribly sloppy laboratory procedure. Slughorn himself was lounging in an armchair that matched him fairly well in shape and size.

"What do you want me to do, professor?" His voice sounded jarringly mechanical, but he'd realized long ago that he spent so much time controlling himself that people thought he actually sounded that way.

"Oh, this and that, nothing too strenuous." Slughorn gestured imperiously to something covered with a sheet. "Rather odd artifact Miss Sparrowhawk uncovered during her unwonted sojourn in the old classroom. From what I've been able to piece together, it's some sort of guarding spell, but needs a particular potion to awaken its powers. Nothing conventional has worked, and we've tried quite a bit. If you could give it a good dusting and bring it up to the table, then…?"

Severus conjured a rag, doubting the Slug concerned himself with such mundane details, and yanked the sheet off the "artifact," which turned out to be an exceptionally fearsome gargoyle, barely visible under a layer of scum. It looked like fairly mundane mold to him, but as regarded unknown magic, it was risky to assume. He prodded it a few times with his wand and, noting nothing untoward, attacked it with the rag.

Slughorn went on, rambling to himself and agreeing as usual, certain he had an audience. Severus couldn't help listening. "Clever, isn't she, Miss Phoebe? I think she's even passed _you_ in potions, and almost a year younger! Of course, being born in September is always a set-back in schooling. Not at all fair."

There was a pause, so Severus nodded, aware Slughorn probably wouldn't notice. "How's your mother getting along, by the way? I've always thought it a pity such a bright girl couldn't make a bit better of herself. No insult intended, of course, but marrying some muggle flyboy? Nothing wrong with muggles, but, well, you know what can happen!"

Severus bit his tongue to keep from answering.

"How is your father, by the way? I was having a word with Healer MacDunstan the other day—have you met her? Excellent young witch, finished her Healer's qualifications very quickly, a favorite student of mine. Says your mother's still trying to get St. Mungo's to treat him!"

"She is." He scraped viciously behind the gargoyle's head, clawing at the crust of mildew as though it were Slughorn and very other pompous, pure-blooded, condescending separatist wizard he'd ever spoken to.

"If we treated every sick muggle, we'd have them running to us for every cold. A bit of bias of your father's behalf is natural, but if you think practically…"

"Yes, sir." Severus gave the matter some practical thought. He thought of all the harm that could come of removing the tumors from his father's lungs, straightening his mangled arm, and returning his failing liver to healthy performance. Grudgingly, he admitted that curing _any_ terminally ill muggle would be a massive breach of the Statute of Secrecy, but for one whose brother, wife, and children were all quite magical, the bloody exception begged to be made.

"How's that potion you were experimenting with coming along, anyway?" Though he didn't bother to look, Severus could feel the smugness on Slughorn's face. "Interesting idea, though, I must say, negating magic could be quite dangerous. In theory, quite thrilling, but what would you use it for?"

_Douse you in it, for starters._ Mostly, he wanted to see if it was _possible_ to (impermanently) block a person's magic use and, as an apparently unavoidable side effect, any effects it might have on them, for the sheer joy of doing something weird. It also satisfied him to think he could probably prove that the difference between muggle and wizard was more a matter of degree—if a potion existed, a potion with the opposite effect did, whether known or not. Standard principle. Though few would actually believe him, it would give him considerable personal satisfaction. "To throw at my brother and see if anyone notices." He attempted to look like he hadn't meant to say that out loud.

"Ah, now, Severus, there's really no need for jealousy." Slughorn popped some crystallized pineapple, the smell of which made Severus gag from across the room. He couldn't even imagine swallowing a lump of congealed sugar for recreational purposes. "I've never met twins so different as you two, and I do know several pairs. The Latoya sisters, for instance, met them on a teacher exchange program in Madrid, you might have seen them at the Quidditch cup this year. They did a wonderful show after the game. No? Well, in any case, you have your strengths and he his. Honestly, what is charm and a knack for Quidditch next to pure intellect? My advice is to be pleased, not disappointed, with your own talents."

He nodded vaguely, deciding not to point out that he was better at Quidditch than Hector. Slytherin didn't allow mudbloods on the house team. Nodding at appropriate intervals throughout Slughorn's next tirade, he swiped the last of the crust of dust off the gargoyle's head. As it was cleared away, he saw that the stone was inscribed in fairly bad Latin. Squinting, his nose so close it actually touched the grimy marble, cursing his lousy eyes, he skimmed the passage. Though he didn't know half the words at first reading, it was pretty clearly instructions, presumably for making the gargoyle do whatever it was supposed to do.

"Uh, professor? I think I found the manual." Sloughorn cut himself off in mid pomposity to make a quizzical noise. "There's something written here. It's pretty scratched up, but there're definitely some kind of instructions." Haltingly, he tried to translate. "Stone… ex ostia… Sounds like a vacation destination… Take you… That's an imperative. Oh, I got it. Take the stone from the mouth, and… don't know that word… in water… must be soak or something… Yeah, must be. Cover… Well, I'd kill for a dictionary, but I'm pretty sure we take some kind of stone from either the mouth of a river or this thing's mouth… Depends how well this guy knew Latin. And then we take water that the rock's been soaked in and pour it on the gargoyle."

"Grotesque."

"It's not that ugly…"

Slughorn laughed indulgently. "It's only a gargoyle if there's a fountain in its mouth. Otherwise, the architectural term is 'grotesque.'"

"Well, okay, but that's pretty much how we wake it up. But there's a lot more written here, and I won't try for it all off the top of my head." Severus almost let himself smile. Whatever he was about to find out had to be interesting at the least. "I'll run for a dictionary. And maybe Dumbledore." Severus stood, wiping the dust off the front of his robes.

"Oh, where's your sense of adventure?" Slughorn actually stood up, and waddled over. "Go ahead, check it's mouth for a stone. Great discoveries aren't made with dictionaries and careful planning!"

That was news to Severus, but he didn't dare disobey. Slughorn's ire was nothing he wanted to provoke. He was mildly more afraid of his teacher's temper than of releasing an old, mostly unknown magic. Swiping some of the dust off the dragon-like snout, he wriggled his fingers between the wickedly sharp fangs. He couldn't fit them past the second joint, but groping for a minute knocked something small and smooth free. He pulled out his fingers and a polished red stone fell out.

"Well, we don't have to go trawling in any rivers, excellent, excellent," Slughorn gloated, picking up the stone an turning it over in his fingers, more like a pawnshop owner than an accomplished wizard.

"Er, are you sure we shouldn't go for Dumbledore?" Severus had cut himself on one of the teeth and found it increased his apprehensiveness. Not knowing what that thing was supposed to guard or how dangerous it might be, he didn't want those teeth given any leeway they didn't have at the moment.

"Nonsense! I should think he'll be quite pleased with us, solving the problem without his needing to interfere." Severus felt this was a terrible choice of words, and started to inch away. "Well, what _are_ you waiting for? If you've got it right, all we need to do is steep this stone in some water."

He realized where it was all going. If his translation was wrong, or something truly unpleasant happened, it was all Severus' fault. Grinding his teeth, he filled a cup lying on the desk and allowed Slughorn to drop the stone in. The water immediately turned the muddy red of rust.

"Well, something's certainly happening," Slughorn observed brightly as the cup's temperature soared, scorching Severus' fingers. Wincing, he emptied the cup over the grotesque's head.

For a long moment, nothing happened, and Severus decided that with such sloppy potion use and simplistic directions that was all that could have been expected. Then the grotesque's wings snapped open, and it launched itself into the air, landing on top of the door to glare down at them and shake off some of the dust.

"What on Earth?"

Shocked with himself, Severus had to admit he was thinking roughly the same thing. The gargoyles, no, grotesques guarding several doors around Hogwarts could move, certainly, but only in one way, and had no choice about it. Supposedly, giving life to something to the degree where it could move and, apparently, _think_ freely was as magically impossible as raising the dead.

The creature opened its mouth, flashing fangs that seemed to have grown considerably through the awakening process. A hiss and some dust escaped, then, quite clearly, it spoke. "I am the Servant of the Half Blood Prince."


End file.
